


Into the Wild Blue - Scene

by elysiumwaits



Series: Snippets of Projects [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Arguing, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Feelings, Swearing, scene from a larger project
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-10-03 21:22:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20459669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elysiumwaits/pseuds/elysiumwaits
Summary: A scene from a larger project I'm working on. Can actually stand alone pretty well, may or may not finish it. Entire summary for full project is in the notes.--The sound of the screen door banging open jars him. He jerks his head up just in time to see Darcy come flying down the steps of the porch in a fury, hair blowing behind her. She comes to a stop a few feet in front of the truck, headlights illuminating the fact that she’s just wearing her underwear and one of the shirts Clint had left on the floor of the bedroom. She’s gorgeous, he thinks in a detached way, with her chest heaving in anger and her eyes bright in the headlights of his old Chevy 1500.Then he realizes that she’s not gonna move from that spot in front of the truck.“Darcy.” He leans out of the window. Clint’s afraid if he gets out of the truck, he won’t be strong enough to get back in. “Honey, move.”





	Into the Wild Blue - Scene

**Author's Note:**

> This one scene just wouldn't let me go, even though I'm really not focusing on this project right now. The whole fic will be called "Into the Wild Blue," will be Clint/Darcy, with the following summary:
> 
> _When Darcy’s divorce is finalized, she’s got nothing left except a doublewide on two acres just outside of a tiny town in Missouri and a whole lot of heartache she didn’t ask for. The man that rolls into town in a beat-up Chevy is the last thing she needs in her life, but she can’t deny the attraction. She’s made a lot of bad decisions in her life, what’s one more?_
> 
> _The Battle of New York, the death of Phil Coulson, and the lingering trauma of Loki’s mind control are together too much for Clint to handle, so he does what he does best - he runs. He doesn’t expect to walk into a bar and fall headfirst into an ill-advised whirlwind romance. He knows he needs to keep Darcy away from the dangers of his life and what he’s running from, but the trick of it is that Darcy just won’t go - she’s with him for better or for worse._
> 
> It'll be very romance novel-y, I think, with a hint of romantic drama. It'll definitely be angsty, dealing with PTSD in both Clint, from Loki, and Darcy, from her previous marriage. However, I literally almost always write a happy ending, and it would end well.
> 
> Feel free to tell me what you think in the comments or come shoot me an ask at [Elysium Waits](https://elysiumwaits.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr.

Clint lingers longer than he should. 

She’s moved away from him in the night, the curves of her body under the sheets lit by the pale light of the moon that’s creeping through open curtains. He pulls the comforter over her when she shivers from the night breeze coming through the screen, listens to the grateful little sleepy hum he gets in reward. Clint knows he should go, knows that he needs to slip out into the night and disappear down the road. He wasn’t supposed to stay this long in the first place, but Darcy drew him in like a moth to a faded yellow porch light, and now he’s trapped in the glow of her. 

Somewhere along the way, the little doublewide trailer has started to feel like home. This bed feels like his, like  _ theirs _ , and fuck, he doesn’t want to go. He thinks of blood and icy blue eyes, though, coming into this safe haven, this peaceful little pocket of existence where he can hear the tree frogs and the crickets and the soft little hums Darcy makes when he runs his fingertips over her skin as she sleeps. What he’s done… he doesn’t deserve this peace, doesn’t deserve the smiles she gives him or the care she handles him with.

So he needs to go.

Easing out of the bed is easy - he’s a trained assassin, after all, and it’s all about shifting weight. Darcy doesn’t stir until he’s standing and pulling a flannel shirt on over his t-shirt. 

“Clint? Where you goin’, baby?” she asks, sleep-heavy and drawled in that way she tries to hide when she’s fully awake.

Oh, this is the hardest thing he’s ever done. Clint closes his eyes for a second, squeezes them tight, and then comes around to Darcy’s side of the bed. He takes a moment of indulgence, runs his fingers through the dark waves of her hair, presses a kiss to her temple as she settles back into the pillow and blankets. 

“Just getting a drink of water,” he lies. “Go back to sleep, Darce.”

She closes her eyes again, gives a little satisfied sigh. “Mmkay,” she mumbles out, already halfway asleep.

He lingers, again, strokes her hair one more time. And then, when he’s sure she’s asleep, he slips out of the bedroom, even as everything in him is screaming at him to stay, to get back in bed and curl around Darcy once more.

Clint’s bag is packed - necessities only - and his bow’s already in the truck. He’d taken care of it earlier while she’d been distracted in the garden, a sick feeling in his stomach as he’d quickly shoved clothes into the duffle. Now, that sick feeling is just bone-deep exhaustion with a hint of resignation, and a whole lot of heartache. He can’t even leave her a number, nothing to tie her to him. 

He closes and locks the door as softly as he can, kicks off the porch light as he passes it. The truck isn’t quiet, of course, it’s too old to be stealthy, and the passenger door creaks as he opens it to throw the duffle bag in. He closes it and leans against it for a moment, presses his forehead to the metal that’s damp with the midnight dew. Then, with all the resolve of a man walking to the gallows, he climbs into the driver’s seat and turns the engine over, cranks the windows down.

“ _ You son of a bitch! _ ”

The sound of the screen door banging open jars him. He jerks his head up just in time to see Darcy come flying down the steps of the porch in a fury, hair blowing behind her. She comes to a stop a few feet in front of the truck, headlights illuminating the fact that she’s just wearing her underwear and one of the shirts Clint had left on the floor of the bedroom. She’s gorgeous, he thinks in a detached way, with her chest heaving in anger and her eyes bright in the headlights of his old Chevy 1500. 

Then he realizes that she’s not gonna move from that spot in front of the truck. 

“Darcy.” He leans out of the window. Clint’s afraid if he gets out of the truck, he won’t be strong enough to get back in. “Honey, move.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. She plants her feet and clenches her jaw, gets her hands on her hips. “You wanna leave, Clint? You run me the hell over.”

“Darce,  _ move _ ,” Clint tries again, a little more steel in his voice, the kind he uses on people under his command. 

It just pisses her off, of course. No one in the world tells Darcy Lewis what to do. “No! You don’t get to sneak out in the middle of the night on me, Barton, you wanna leave me, then you  _ look me in the eye _ and you tell me why!” 

Clint pulls his head back in the window to smack the back of it against the seat. He doesn’t cut the engine - he’s gonna go, he  _ has _ to go - but he wrenches open the door and steps down, crunch of boots on gravel. 

“You don’t get to pretend this didn’t mean anything.” Darcy’s voice is shaking with the anger, and now that he’s closer, now that he can see more than just her in the white light of the headlights, he can tell that she’s one good word away from crying. 

“Darce,” he says, automatically reaches out to brush away the one tear that she lets slip. 

She smacks his hand away. “Don’t get the wrong idea, Clint, this is me crying because I can’t  _ murder you _ ! You sleep in my bed for two fucking months, you look me in the eye and tell me you think you love me, you give me the  _ one good thing _ that’s happened to me in the last five years, and then you try to take it away! Like I never meant one thing to you!”

“I have to go, Darcy,” Clint tries, clenches his fist at his side. “I can’t stay.”

“I told you, you can leave.” She flings a hand out, gesturing wildly at the truck. “You can leave any time you damn well want to, but you can either run me over, or you tell me  _ why _ .” Another tear falls, and Clint aches. “I deserve that much, Clint, I  _ deserve _ to know.”

She’s right, is the thing. Leaving her without a trace was Plan A because it’s the safest, but that’s obviously gone out the window. Now, with her in front of him, he can’t just walk away, can’t make himself be mean enough so she wants him to. 

“I’m trying to protect you,” he says. “There’s… things about my past, Darce, there’re people out there who are trying to find me, and you deserve so much more than getting caught up in the bullshit that’s my life.”

Darcy stares at him for a long moment. “Clint, you are somehow the smartest and dumbest man that I know.” Her voice is softer, but still shaking. “You think I don’t  _ know _ ?” 

That stops him, and he watches her as she presses on, some of the anger going out of her like a balloon slowly deflating.

“I knew the minute you walked into that bar you were running from something,” she says, harsh and desperate. “You keep your boots by the bed, you call for someone named ‘Tasha’ in your sleep. You’re always armed, I know you are, even when you try to hide it. And sometimes, baby, I look at you, and you’re not  _ here _ , you’re somewhere far away in your own mind.” Darcy pauses, swallows. 

She shivers, and Clint notices for the first time that she’s barefoot. He strips off his flannel shirt and steps closer, drapes it over her shoulders. Darcy doesn’t stop him, but she grabs his hand before he can pull away. 

“Clint, if you wanna leave, then go. I won’t stop you. But we all have baggage, baby, and  _ I don’t care _ what you’ve done, or what you think you’ve done.” She clings to his hand, and he lets her. 

He’s not strong enough to pull away. Oh, sure, he could break the hold she’s got on him easy, it’s not like she’d keep him there, but Clint’s not emotionally strong enough to yank his hand from her grasp. “I got a lot of blood on my hands, Darcy,” he says. “A lot of… red in my ledger. There are people out there who want to find me, and when they do… I don’t know what’ll happen.”

“You’re a good man,” Darcy says, uses one hand to pull his shirt tighter around her. “You’re good for me. And I’m good for you.” Another tear comes down, and she looks away, up at the night sky, blinking like she’s trying to hold the rest back. “I don’t want to be selfish, Clint.”

“Sweetheart, you don’t know the meaning of the word.”

It’s the next tear that does it, breaks his resolve, and he pulls her into his arms, rests his chin on the top of her head. Her hand comes up to curl in the back of his shirt, and Clint knows that he’s done for, he’s stuck, this is it. 

“Please don’t go,” Darcy manages on a half-hitched sob. “Just… just come back to bed.”

He nods, buries his face in her hair for a moment. “Let me turn the truck off.” 

She stands in front of it still, a little extra insurance, he knows, as he pulls the keys out of the ignition and closes the creaking door. Darcy’s still barefoot, starts to walk when he gets to her, but he scoops her up, lets her bury her head in his neck and keep her feet off the rough gravel and dewy wet grass. 

He puts her back down once they’re safely on the smooth plywood of the porch, ushers her through the screen door. Clint can feel her watching him as he closes and locks the front door. As soon as he steps back, her hand is curling around his wrist, and he goes, lets himself be led back to the bedroom.

They don’t say a word until Clint’s boots are off, by the bed, and they’re both under the sheet and comforter once more. Darcy curls into him, a little ball with her face buried in his chest, and he wraps around her as best he can, tangles their legs together and lets her use his arm as a pillow when she uncurls just a little bit.

“You said you thought you loved me,” she says, mostly to his arm. 

Clint cards his fingers through her hair, gently works out the tangles from the night breeze. “I do love you.” He hates how his voice sounds when he finally gets the words out, a little choked and desperate. “Darcy, I love you more than I’ve loved anything else in my life, and that scares the holy fuck out of me. I can’t lose you, I wouldn’t survive it.”

She shifts, and he gets a good look at her face. Fuck him, but she’s still crying, silent little tears leaking out of her eyes. He wants to kick his own ass.

“You’re not the kind of man I can just get over. This isn’t some fling for me,” she says, soft. “It won’t be like you were never here, if you go. The only way you lose me, Clint, is if you push me away first. So if you’re gonna go, if you  _ need to leave _ , then you better figure me into your travel plans.”

“I love you,” he says again, because it’s the only thing he can say that will encompass everything that he feels for her in this moment - the worry and the longing and deep sense of rightness that he gets just from having her here in his arms. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too.” Darcy burrows back into him. “I’m sorry I called you a son of a bitch.”

“Don’t be, I earned that one. You, uh,” he falters just long enough that Darcy pulls back once more to look at him. He clears his throat. “You mentioned that I’ve given you the ‘one good thing’ you’ve had in five years?”

Darcy stares at him for a moment in the moonlight. “You really gonna make me spell that one out for you? You fishin’ for compliments, is that it?” He can’t see it, but he can hear the smile in her voice. “You know exactly what I meant.”

“Maybe I do,” he says, runs his hand down the line of her side. “Tell me anyway.”

“You and your ego. You, Clint, are the best thing that’s happened to me.”

“Since your divorce?” 

He gets a light smack for that one, and then she’s pressing close again, content little sigh slipping out of her mouth. Clint doesn’t feel wetness on her cheeks against his chest anymore, and he’s so damn grateful for it that  _ he _ could cry.

“If I’d known you were coming, I never would have married the asshole,” she murmurs, and sounds like she’s seriously thinking about falling asleep. 

Clint rubs her back again - he doesn’t want to stop touching her now, doesn’t want to think about driving away and never getting to touch her again. “Go to sleep, Darcy.”

“You’ll be here when I wake up?” Her voice breaks his heart, small and pleading. 

“Yeah,” he says, rough. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” It’s not a lie, is the thing. He’ll be here when she wakes up, Clint knows, and he’ll be here every hour, day, week after that. All the time he can get, until he’s dragged away, kicking and screaming, back into blood and fighting and danger. Walking away from her earlier was all the strength he had for it - now that he’s come back, he won’t leave again.

He listens to the sound of her breath evening out, feels her go heavy with sleep in his arms. In the morning, Darcy will wake up, and she’ll panic until she finds him in the kitchen, making eggs and bacon and apology pancakes. The other shoe will drop, and it will drop soon, but for the moment, they have the crickets and the peace and each other.


End file.
